In far less than one lifetime, opinion on CP in schools has performed a dramatic reversal that could be described as a "pendulum swing".
As a schoolboy I would daily watch a TV program called Children's Channel Seven in which host Caroline Noble would walk amongst the live audience of schoolies wearing her Mouseketeer ears and engage with the kids. One of her oft used questions to boys, spoken with a smile, was: "did you get the cuts today?", a reference to handcaning, the common practice in WA government schools.
The fact that a locally produced children's program could talk about school CP as though it were a daily occurrence and do so with a smile is testament to the widespread acceptance of its place in education.
I could go on to mention the English program WHACKO, aired on our TV about the same time and a number of comics and books that deployed CP references - all aimed at a children's audience or readership.
In a relatively short period some social engineering occurred that made it politically correct to turn right around and steam in the other direction. Having, as they do, a great capacity to follow populist views, people obliged by complying. I heard it expressed by one ordinary citizen (a woman) like this:
"I tell my daughter it was right for then, but its not right for now" No further analysis was offered.
One could well argue that following norms is just what people had done previously. True..except that the use of CP in pedagogy goes back thousands of years and for one generation to totally dismiss it in a few years - and with reasoning that, logically followed, made all their forbears (living and dead) into damaged people and child abusers - could be seen as arrogance.
The question is: Is a pendulum swing a sound way to change policy or does it by definition result in an extreme? Put another way...could the pendulum swing so hard it comes off its hinge and flies into the crowd?